


we wear silk in the city

by sodiumflare



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Rule 63, possibly the most literal interpretation of 'slow burn'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 09:35:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13338462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sodiumflare/pseuds/sodiumflare
Summary: Her eyes follow Damen through the sun mostly of their own accord.





	we wear silk in the city

**Author's Note:**

> “What witch, Andromeda, addled your wits?  
> Some farm-girl with her faded calico  
> Dragging in the dust. This season,  
> Hemlines skim slim ankle-bones  
> And we wear silk  
> In the city.”  
> — Sappho, Fragment 57. Trans. Anita George
> 
> Takes place before the games at Marlas.

Akielos is hot. At least it's a dry heat, Laurent's mind unhelpfully supplies. That's true; it's also not the point. Humidity or not, her cotton shirts are damp with sweat under her immaculate jackets when Damen unlaces her - 

No. Not Damen anymore. Instead, it's someone else's hands, a girl she doesn't - 

Laurent savagely bites down on the thought before it can go any further. She hasn't had Damen's hands on her in weeks. 

That's deliberate, Laurent reminds herself, and damn the discomfort: it was a necessary shove away after - anyway, the distance between them means the kyroi are less likely to see the Princess of Akielos as the Princess of Vere's cowed pet. 

(Queens, Laurent thinks.)

Still. 

It's far from the first choice Laurent's made that's left her feeling bruised. But this one - 

Bandaged under her shirt, her shoulder aches. She ignores it. 

Her eyes follow Damen through the sun mostly of their own accord. They wear less here, these Akielon barbarians, though she now should admit that it's a sensible adaptation to the climate. Should admit. She won't, though, and Laurent's staying in her silks to her wrists, thank you, but she can still appreciate Damen's skin shining bronze in the sun. Damen's throwing javelin with Nikandros, the laughter and grace she'd gradually revealed after Arles (and which Laurent had chained and beaten in Arles; Laurent can admit that) now on full display.

Small wonder. Damen's in her home country now, relaxed with the people she knows best. While Laurent - 

At least in Vere, she held the advantages of her nobility, skilled navigation of Vere's social strata, and excellent instincts for which skeletons were in which closets. Or beds. 

Here - even in the pavilion's shade, sweat snakes under her collar; it tickles. Laurent ignores it. Damen throws again, and gold flashes as the late afternoon sun strikes the cuff on her wrist. 

The assembled field is impressive; there are more kyroi here than Laurent could have gathered on her own; Damen's native, impossible charisma has done more than Laurent's machinations could. And climate aside, the open fields of Akielos are - well, they're not Aquitart, and Nikandros is probably handier with a sword than Arnoul. 

They have a chance here. 

Still, it's hot, even with the noon hours behind them. There's mountain ice in the cup at her elbow, at least, dissolving into water flavored with berries, and she imagines the path that brought it down from the mountains, packed in sawdust. The Vaskians had had ice, and Laurent brought some to Damen in their tent after Damen had - 

That damned woman, and her damned foolish bravery, and oh, the somehow loyalty that Laurent wants to lick out of her mouth like honey. 

A thud as Damen's spear sings true for the umpteeth time, gold again flashes, and Damen's easy, sincere joy shines, torch-bright. 

If they play this right - 

She sips her water. Blackberry is sweet on her tongue, and the sun is slipping near to the horizon. The sky glows gold. 

For so long, Laurent's been sowing crops in careful rows and now Damen is burning them all down, a wildfire setting the earth ablaze, seeds cracking open in the scorch.

Attend me, Laurent thinks.


End file.
